Comments on: The good things about Larry Summershttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/
A slice of lime in the sodaSun, 26 Oct 2014 19:05:02 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=3.8.3By: Ken Houghtonhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7619
Tue, 06 Oct 2009 18:38:45 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7619Cash for Clunkers worked: addressed externalities, got people buying, is a large part of the positive GDP all y’all are talking about for Q3.

It was, as with most ObamaNation initiatives, poorly discussed. (For someone who is a “leader,” BarryO has been drug around by the likes of Max Baucus and Joe Liarman.)

That said, the “first” stimulus is a concrete example of Failed Obama Policy–of which he himself admitted (and John Emerson noted on this blog) that he “started with his ultimate compromise” and got whittled down from there.

]]>By: Sanjayhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7605
Tue, 06 Oct 2009 14:08:39 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7605There’s also the closing of Gitmo, which was probably the most high-profile policy rollout.
]]>By: KenGhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7604
Tue, 06 Oct 2009 14:05:44 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7604For those who are saying Obama is not in control of getting his plans implemented (e.g., health care, the stimulus package), or that Bush did a better job (@Kyle), keep in mind that Bush had Tom DeLay to strong-arm his own party into doing whatever the Bush/Rove/Cheney machine wanted. There is nobody as sleazy in the Democratic party to get Obama’s platform accepted by everyone in his own party. There is no hammer, just a bunch of congressmen who think that because they got 100,000 votes that their lobbyists know what’s best for the nation.
]]>By: Carol SHANNONhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7594
Tue, 06 Oct 2009 01:52:58 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7594If you are looking for bad policy, poorly executed, you can start with the Cash for Clunkers debacle.
]]>By: Sanjayhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7593
Tue, 06 Oct 2009 01:43:44 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7593I’m an Obamaphile an I dearly love your blog and your analysis, but there’s such an obvious example of biffed Obama policy that my jaw drops when I read your three criteria: Obama intervened heavy-handedly to switch out generals in Afghanistan to put a guy who did COIN in, committed 17K more troops, went around the world telling other people to put in more troops — and months after doing all that hasn’t so much as settled on his war aims. I mean, c’mon!

It shouldn’t if we’re asking the parallel question we asked about Bush. Bush was very effective at getting a number of his policies past. Tax cut, NCLB, and the Iraq War all involved fairly impressive political skill in gaining support.

]]>By: Uncle Billy Cunctatorhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7587
Mon, 05 Oct 2009 19:50:15 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7587KenG: After looking at Jamie Dimon’s smirk while being interviewed by Charlie Rose, as he says [approximately] “Buying a house and and buying a house on fire are not the same thing,” I am a very difficult person to convince of this.

After seeing Madoff go to prison without giving up his bosses… I am a very difficult person to convince.

After seeing the level of capture of the financial world on both the national and global level, blah blah blah…

going back over the past 4 years. Gather up all the posts, print, and you’ll have a sprawling indictment that only begins to get at the whole megillah.

]]>By: KenGhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7579
Mon, 05 Oct 2009 17:26:25 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7579Uncle Billy, I don’t think there were arsonists, just a bunch of kids playing with matches while the alleged adults were so busy eating that they didn’t notice what the kids were doing. Although I guess some of the adults believed the kids would act in their best interest and not start a fire, and other adults just thought any fire that got started would be put out by another fire. You know, the magic of the kitchen. But it’s all good now, we’re going to get a brand new house, and the grandkids will pay for it.
]]>By: Uncle Billy, Cunctatorhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7570
Mon, 05 Oct 2009 16:04:05 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7570“So if your kitchen was on fire…”

Nicely put, but we’d better think about identifying the arsonist more clearly too.

]]>By: KenGhttp://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/comment-page-1/#comment-7563
Mon, 05 Oct 2009 14:25:54 +0000http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/10/05/the-good-things-about-larry-summers/#comment-7563Bush has set the bar so low, that now when the government doesn’t totally screw up, we give out high grades. Yes, it’s great the financial system didn’t disintegrate, but that feat could have been accomplished more efficiently. Too many executives who performed horribly still have jobs, and the compensation system for financial companies doesn’t reflect the fact that earnings of companies in this industry, and therefore the bonuses of their employees, have been greatly subsidized by government funding and guarantees.

So if your kitchen was on fire and the Bush fire department’s response was to let it burn it self out, and the Obama FD decided to flood the entire house to put the fire out, you would might say that at least it didn’t burn down, and congratulate the Obama team for not burning the whole house down. But you know there could have been a better way to stop the fire without having to call those over-priced, labor exploiting vultures from service master to clean up the flood damage.